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"An empowered organization is one in which individuals have the knowledge, skill, desire and opportunity to personally succeed in a way that leads to organizational success."

-Stephen Covey

Lynn has spent 30 years in the Financial Services Industry

For the past 10 years she has been providing custom sales, service and leadership training to organizations both large and small

She is an in-demand keynote speaker and member of the National Speakers' Association

IMPORTANT UPDATE:Lynn's total knee replacement went well. She's now focusing on the road to recovery. She thanks you for your warm wishes and support.

TODAY'S MESSAGE

Ownership Thinking

If you are a business owner, manager, or a dedicated employee, don’t you wish everyone thought about your business the way you do? Customers would receive better service, teams would run more smoothly and businesses would be more prosperous if all those representing a company incorporated ownership thinking. This means looking at the business through the customer’s eyes and embracing accountability, efficiency and service excellence. One needs to move beyond a level of normal initiative, and take genuine ownership in the following areas:

“Your building’s look” I often see an employee walk right past some trash on the floor or near its front door to enter. All representatives need to take ownership in the appearance of their place of work. From parking lot to customer counter we need to see what the customer sees and look through their eyes to exceed expectations.

“Employee actions” All too often customers wait while two co-workers have a conversation about “last night’s date, a joke, perhaps a previous customer’s frustration.” All these actions are observed by customers. The representative is failing to focus on the customer and be dedicated to them. This is one of the most common errors in retail service. We have all experienced it, with varying levels of frustration, as we wait until the co-workers complete their story before providing service to us.

Here are some other areas for improvement:

Chewing gum. (I have yet to meet a good gum chewer! Gum chewing has no place in business.)

Eating or drinking where customers can see you.

Applying make-up or any type of personal grooming.

Personal phone calls.

I started my business over 14 years ago doing mystery shopping. This is a blessing and a curse! One’s expectations are for good service and often disappointed. Once you learn to look at your own business and others through the customer’s eyes your vision will become much broader. This is exactly the type of ownership thinking all employees need to incorporate in order to successfully rise above the others. In today’s market it is only service that will differentiate you from the competition. Consider the following:

Sales campaigns and promotions. Is your point of sale material and advertising professional and appealing to the eye?

Might your business be looking cluttered or in disarray?

If you offer coffee and cookies is the area tidy and clean?

Go outside your building and walk in with a new approach and eyes.

Ownership thinking also means looking at the business as if it were yours with regard to costs and never being wasteful. If you are an owner reading this you know exactly what I mean. Representatives need to use products as if they were purchasing them from their own sources. I often witness unnecessary waste that the customer fails to recognize or appreciate.

The last area of ownership thinking has to do with self development. Those that will rise above the others are continually learning. We need to live in the learning zone and make a commitment to add knowledge, experience and new ideas on a regular basis. C-A-N-E-I – Constant And Never Ending Improvement.

She will gladly help you with your sales success through individual sales coaching, classroom training or custom designed programs.

* Featured Book of the Month*

*Featured Book *

Stake in the Outcome: Building a Culture of Ownership for the Long-Term Success of Your Businessby Jack Stack, Bo Burlingham

From Publishers Weekly
A refreshingly sensitive and sensible guide to motivating employees, this new volume by Stack and Burlingham (The Great Game of Business) is a standout in its crowded genre. Stack is the president and CEO of SRC Holdings Corporation, an employee-owned supplier of renovated engines to auto companies and a celebrated business success story. In 1983, when it looked like SRC's parent company, International Harvester, might shut down its southwestern Missouri "remanufacturing" plant, Stack and 12 other employees bought the place and fashioned a system of employee ownership that turned SRC into a corporation of 22 companies with more than $100 million in sales. Using the experiences of SRC as well as other companies with "ownership cultures" as examples, Stack and Burlingham, an editor at Inc. magazine, give the lowdown on how to keep employees energized, creative and acting like true owners of their company (beyond offering stock options). Their strategy, which is especially resonant after the Enron debacle, hinges largely on opening up the books to all employees and keeping the staff posted on financial matters. Also fascinating is the authors' idea of spinning workers off into an entirely new company as a way of stirring up new ideas from entrenched employees. This is an invigorating and surprisingly helpful text for those who want a humane but profitable way to manage their company.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Solicit an objective view of yourself or your business and ask for candid feedback. How do you or your business come across to your customers? What impression do you leave? Learn to really look at your business through your customer's eyes.

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